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KFC shifts marketing to focus on quality and provenance

KFC is focusing on quality and provenance in shift in its marketing to change perceptions about its food in the UK and Ireland.

In its first work by Mother, "The whole chicken," the brand has taken a bold approach with a badass chicken fronting the ad, strutting to X Gon’ Give It To Ya by DMX.

The ad is designed to reinforce that 100% of its on-the-bone chicken is always fresh, sourced from UK and Irish Red Tractor Assured farms, and prepared fresh on site all day.

The TV spot features eight chickens and two cockerels dancing around a barn, be it body-popping or twerking. It ends with the tag line: "the chicken, the whole chicken and nothing but the chicken." The ad was directed by Siri Bunford through Knucklehead.

It is supported by outdoor ads featuring the food in a move away from the stylised format for fast food restaurants, taking the approach seen by many Instagram users. The chicken has also been photographed by James Day in an heroic pose for other outdoor ads.

Mother has also commissioned seven renowned graffiti artist including INSA, McBess, Shotopop and Barrass to create murals. These are being painted on the side of a building in Shoreditch and captured on camera to share across KFC’s social channels, with the entire collection animated together through INSA’s Gif-iti app.

Hermeti Balarin, executive creative director of Mother, added: "KFC chicken is of the highest quality. But somehow, despite previous attempts at communicating this message, people never really got it. So we created a campaign that is impossible to ignore."